The use of various training bats is well known, and many designs and configurations have heretofore been employed to increase a ball player's strength and bat speed. The increased bat speed achieves the desired result of increasing the distance a ball will travel when struck.
Among methods and devices employed to increase bat speed are "doughnut" weights, which derive their name from their doughnut shape. Doughnut weights slide over the knob end of a bat and fit snugly around the barrel portion of the bat. The ball player then swings the weighted bat to increase strength during practice and to warm up during a game. However, one drawback of the doughnut weight is that the resultant swing motion is unnatural since the weight is concentrated in one small area of the bat rather than uniformly distributed along the barrel portion of the bat. Moreover, the external location of the weight near or on the barrel prevents the ball player from hitting balls with the weighted bat. Furthermore, doughnut weights have a tendency to become jammed on the bat and can be difficult to remove. Moreover, in some instances a jammed weight can damage the bat.
Similarly, other designs employ weights either disposed on the outside of the barrel portion of the bat (Wales, U.S. Pat. No. 5,050,877) or extending axially from the knob portion of the bat (Nolan, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,674,138 and 5,741,193). Again, the positioning of the weights in these designs produces an unnatural swing motion.
Later, internal weights were incorporated into training bat designs. For example, the design disclosed in Rewolinski, U.S. Pat. No. 5,277,421, includes a single weight disposed on a stem in the barrel portion of the bat. The stem and weight are received in an axial sleeve in the end portion of the bat. Therefore, a ball player cannot use weights in combination to enhance training, and thus, one disadvantage of the Rewolinski design is that it cannot accommodate more than one weight at a time. Rather, a player must remove the weight currently disposed in the bat before inserting a different weight, which limits the selection of total weight that can be disposed in the bat at any given time.
Therefore, it can be appreciated that there exists a continuing need for a new and improved training bat with a weighting system which permits disposing multiple weights in the bat simultaneously as training requires. These and other advantages will be provided by the training bat set forth in this patent application.